You understand that by a UBI, they mean money-printing, of course. The Fed has already "boosted" the US economy by a few Trillion... with little to show for it:
- Retail Apocalypse - lots of big stores closing down shops, and empty space at lots of malls
- Car manufacture crash - crazy loans for 7 and 8 years which are now going into default
- Credit Card Bubble - people are completely saddled with debt, and can't afford to take any more on -- they may never be able to pay what they have due to interest rates (which are not, or near zero)
- Student Loan debt bubble - a lot of kids graduated college with crummy educations and useless degrees (because financing was so low), and now can't even afford to pay the loans. Since most of the loans are from the Government, guess who's going to pay for them?
- Obliteration of savings -- since the Fed set the rate so low for so long, people were encouraged to spend (in the hopes of fixing the economy) and now most Americans don't have $500 to their name.
- Big bank bailouts -- too big to fail? They get a slap on the wrist for things you and I would go to jail. The Fed prints money, and they buy the stock market, and get richer.
These are the people who'll give you UBI. What could they possibly have in mind?
I suggest you look up Austrian economics, because where the Fed doesn't understand inflation or how to fix the economy, in the words of Janet Yellen, Ludwig Von Mises and Murray Rothbard give you a play by play, and an analysis of prior attempts by governments to create wealth by printing money.
A basic analogy is: if you and I live in a vacuum and start printing money, it'll have no value. There's nothing to exchange it for. And I can't offer any services, because there's nothing to service. It takes the creation of a product by one of us, which the other can buy. That product is the value (so long as you desire it). You then, must create a product I want, or we can develop "money" to exchange for the goods, instead of barter.
You may also want to read up on Hyperinflation, and what happened in places like Weimar, Germany, Argentina, Brazil, Zimbabwe, even Venezuela. UBI will lead down the same path, IMHO. There have been 55 instances of hyperinflation in our history. Why would this time be different?
Yet, we are free men of free will. I have no problem with you wanting UBI or thinking it's a good idea. As a Libertarian, I believe in Live and Let Live. Both philosophies may work simultaneously, and if one fails, we should always be free to change our minds, countries, and economic philosophies.
RE: Universal basic income and true economic stimulus.